


Safe House

by sylwrites



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Comfort, Episode Tag - 1.07, F/M, Missing Scenes, One-Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-11
Updated: 2017-03-11
Packaged: 2018-10-02 17:48:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,917
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10223747
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sylwrites/pseuds/sylwrites
Summary: Yet another coda to 1.07; a missing scene between the sheriff's office and Pop's.





	

**Safe House**

 

_ I am not actually tired, but numb and heavy, and can’t find the right words. All I can say is: stay with me, don’t leave me.  _ \- Franz Kafka

  
  
  


His hand is rough in hers, calloused fingertips sliding slightly against her knuckles as they walk slowly through the streets. His grip is impossibly tight, the pressure cutting straight to Betty’s heart. She hazards a glance at his face, still desperately sad, and her heart breaks a little more. 

 

It all made so much  _ sense _ , looking back. The wrinkled t-shirts, the vast independence he seemed to operate within, the dark circles under his eyes. She had been foolish enough to overlook it, assuming it was part of some kind of grungy aesthetic he was going for. Jughead had always been subversive, sardonic, sarcastic - never part of the mainstream, always on some kind of fringe, stylistically. And Betty had been so preoccupied with her own drama - was still preoccupied, especially lately, with Polly’s escape, discovery, and finally relocation at the Lodge residence - that she hadn’t picked up on the obvious signs. Even with the shift in the nature of her and Jughead’s relationship, and after all that he had done for her, all the ways he’d been there for her, she was still too selfish to notice that one of her oldest friends, her now sort-of boyfriend (she wasn’t totally sure), was homeless, sleeping in drive-ins and closets and god knows where else.

 

He hadn’t been forthcoming with the information, that was true, but Betty wasn’t surprised by that. Jughead had always been the kind of person that was present for other people but not for himself, whose life wasn’t presented but needed to be discovered. At some point between Betty’s summer internship (or maybe even before then) and her pining for Archie, Jughead’s mother had left, his sister had left, and his father had all but pushed him out. It hurt Betty’s heart.

 

“Where do you want to go?” she asks softly, rubbing her thumb over his.

 

Jughead is silent for a few moments, looking straight ahead, then answers. “I don’t know. Can we just - can we just walk?”

 

She nods immediately, squeezing his hand, and edges even closer to him. Betty was no stranger to pain - the emotional kind, anyway. Her mother was a master class in manipulation, control, and fear. It had left Betty riddled with anxiety and bouts of depression, which she kept locked down as tightly as they would go. That was not the face that a Cooper showed to the world. But Jughead had seen it and loved her anyway, not in spite of it but because of it. And Betty hadn’t even asked a single question about him in return. 

 

And there should have been questions. Why are you always the first one here? Why do you stay late? Why does it look like you haven’t slept in weeks, and aren’t your parents worried that you’re wandering the streets at 11pm? 

 

She carries the guilt now, whether she should or not, and she knows she will for a while.

 

Because he’d become everything now, slowly and yet all at once. He made the nightmares go away and he calmed her anxieties the way the pills never had. He was beside her for Polly, for Cheryl, for her mother and father, ready with a hand at her back or a shoulder to dig into. Meanwhile he’d been going through hell, managing it like a professional, and hadn’t sought her out to tell.

 

_ I’m sorry,  _ she wants to say,  _ I can do so much better for you,  _ but that would be making this about her and there will be time for all of that later. So instead Betty presses the side of her face into his shoulder and she moves her feet one ahead of the other in slow tandem with his, until they reach the bleachers behind the school.

 

They sit, the metal cold even through Betty’s jeans, but this is what he needs and right now she would do  _ anything  _ to make him feel even the smallest bit better. The look of absolute devastation on his face outside the sheriff’s office had shook her to her core, shattered her soul and burned the pieces. His hand is still in hers, and she covers it with her other hand, folding them together on his leg. Her heart beats erratically, partly because it’s  _ him  _ and lately he’s turned her stomach under with dancing butterflies, and partly from nerves, to be trying to comfort this boy who had decided months ago that he didn’t need it.

 

“Does your mom know?” Betty asks softly, her eyes focused on his, cast down at their clasped hands. “About where you’ve been sleeping.”

 

Jughead shakes his head. “No. Dad doesn’t either. He thinks I’ve been couchsurfing, mostly at Archie’s.” He gives a slight, empty laugh. “I guess that’ll be true now.”

 

“You could’ve told me,” she blurts. His head turns sharply toward her and Betty’s breath catches in her throat. She swallows, screwing her eyes shut -  _ stupid Betty, jesus -  _ and then resets herself. “I just mean - I could’ve helped you, Juggie. I would’ve wanted - I still want - to help you.”

 

His eyes are a hollow blue, clear and beautiful. They soften at her words, and he tilts his head ever-so-slightly. “You didn’t need this, Betty,” he says quietly, his free hand lifting to her face. “You have so much going on. You don’t need my problems.”

 

“But what about you?” she asks, feeling the familiar sting of tears building behind her eyes.  _ Not now, Betty,  _ she wills herself, but it doesn’t work. “I don’t know how I would have gotten through this so far without you, Juggie.” Emotion clogs her throat. “You’ve been there for me when nobody else was. I  _ need  _ you,” she admits, unable to even bring herself to be embarrassed at her sniffling and blotchy face. “But you - you need people too, Juggie, you don’t have to protect me, I want--”

 

She cuts herself off, unable to voice it, to say,  _ I want you to need me too,  _ but it’s what she means. He is the great plains, supporting everyone around him, but he is also an island, trapped in solitude. Betty lets go of his hands to swipe at her eyes, feeling a little bit of that suppressed shame creep in. She hadn’t meant to lose it now, not when it should be the other way around. He was always so strong and silent, ready with hard logic and soft embraces - it was supposed to be the other way around, for once, that when he needed her, she’d be the rock.

 

Jughead does it again, calming her shaking shoulders with a simple touch. His hand drops to her knee and he stares at it for a moment, then back at her. “Betty, this is going to sound really cliche and lame, but you just being here, that helps.” He glances off in the distance, his eyes unfocusing, but Betty keeps staring at him. “This isn’t a problem that we can solve. It’s just Dad, he’s the only one that can make things better … it’s up to him. So when I go to school, or Pop’s, or wherever, I like that things are still normal. That’s why I didn’t say anything.” His eyes dart nervously back at hers. “And when I’m with you, no matter what we’re doing, I’m happy. It feels … it’s like nothing could ever be wrong enough to make me not happy.”

 

He says the last part quietly and in a rush, the darkening of his cheeks evident even with the dim light of evening. Betty’s stomach flips butterflies again, and she marvels how even right now, with everything going on, that he manages still to make her feel this way. Then she remembers his heavy sigh after their first kiss, the way he’d stammered over his words ( _ Jughead,  _ who prided himself on eloquence) and the stupid smile on his face when she’d kissed him earlier. She suddenly realizes just how rare his smiles are and wonders how long he’d been waiting for her to do that.

 

So Betty leans and kisses him, softly at first. He’s surprised initially but responds quickly, sliding his hand into her hair and deepening the kiss. To this point, the kisses they’ve shared have been sweet, but brief; this time, Betty doesn’t want to stop. She swings one of her legs over the bench so she’s straddling the metal. It lets her scoot closer, her body pressing into Jughead’s, and he quickly copies her and then pulls her in so her legs are hanging over his. 

 

She’s so close to him now that she’d fall backward if his arms weren’t holding her up, and all Betty wants is to be closer. She’s never seen Jughead with a girl - short of Ethel Muggs, who Betty knows gave Jughead his first kiss outside the elementary school when they were eleven - but somehow, that inexperience didn’t matter, because Jughead was a  _ great  _ kisser. Her fingers slide from his face to the edge of his beanie, and Betty stops.

 

She pulls back, breaking the kiss, and looks at him questioningly. He’s been wearing the beanie continuously for years, and Betty doesn’t want to remove it without his consent. His eyes are darkened, breathless, lips slightly swollen, and Betty feels a small thrill run through her that  _ she did that,  _ she made him look that way. Jughead nods slightly, and Betty tugs his beanie off. She’s barely set it down when he tugs her back in, his hands sliding beneath the jacket she’s wearing.

 

They don’t go any further, but he’s clutching her tightly, and when their kiss breaks again he buries his face in her neck. Betty hugs him back, one hand still in his hair and the other wrapped around his shoulders. 

 

They start shaking slightly and Betty feels wetness on her skin. Jughead is such a closed book, writing everyone’s story but his own, and in this moment the only thing Betty wants is to make sure he knows that her arms are a safe place for him. That  _ she  _ is a safe place for him.

 

So they sit there, locked together, his fingers digging into her back. After a few minutes she starts rubbing his back, the denim of his jacket rough on her fingers, and the shaking subsides slowly. Their grip gradually loosens on each other, and as they’re pulling back Betty drops kisses across his face until she reaches his lips. She kisses him softly, briefly, and swipes her thumbs beneath his eyes.

 

“We better go to Pop’s or we’ll miss the Blossoms at Pop’s,” Jughead says finally, his voice a bit ragged.

 

“You don’t have to come, Juggie,” Betty says, trying to fix the sweep of his hair that her fingers had interrupted. “If you want to go straight to Archie’s - it’s okay.”

 

Jughead shakes his head, grabbing Betty’s hand in his. He tugs his beanie on, smiling with slight amusement at her terrible attempt at hairdressing. “You’re here, so I’m there,” he says simply, getting to his feet and offering his hand to help her up.

 

She accepts, and they begin walking across the field in the direction of the local diner. He threads their fingers together, and Betty sweeps her thumb across his. He squeezes back, and Betty watches the small smile stretch across his face.

  
That would always be worth it.


End file.
